OSS and Operation Torch

Abstract

In the early hours of the morning on 8 November 1942 approximately 90,000 Allied troops, mostly American, disembarked from their landing craft at various points in Vichy French-controlled Morocco and Algeria to begin America's first major offensive action of the second world war, Operation Torch. Simultaneously, pro-Allied guerrilla fighters organized by General William J. ('Wild Bill') Donovan's recently formed Office of Strategic Services (OSS) sprang into action to assist the invading forces. These men, who had been recruited and armed over the previous three months by OSS agents stationed in Vichy French North Africa, represented part of a new dimension in the field of American second world war military operations, a dimension which, in addition to guerrilla activities, included extensive espionage and intelligence work, especially in the field of assessing enemy motivation, and the conducting of secret negotiations aimed at creating pro-Allied factions in either enemy or neutral countries. These activities, and their relationship to strategic decision-making and conventional military operations, have so far received little attention from researchers and historians, partly because access to archival material concerning them has been restricted, and partly because the importance of espionage history was, until recently, not fully appreciated. It is the aim of this article to attempt at least a partial remedy of this deficiency with regard to OSS and Operation Torch.' OSS's role in Vichy French North-west Africa was extensive and went back some time. Indeed, the establishment of an American spy network in North-west Africa in the form of the vice-consuls organization preceded both the formation of OSS in June 1942 and the formation of OSS's predecessor organization, the Office of the Co-ordinator of Information (COI), in July 1941. The vice-consuls organization was set up in May 1941, following the MurphyWeygand economic agreement of 10 March 1941, whereby certain American goods could be imported into French North-west Africa,